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Duffy jumped to his feet. “Kind of hoped they would forget about me. Don’t you worry none, princess. I’ll be standing guard. I won’t let no one else ogle the royal bosoms.”
The door closed. She was alone. She could breathe.
What had happened? Could she even believe her eyes?
“Hello, Your Highness.”
She started. “I really wish Fae would stop climbing in through my window.”
The small creature with the huge bushy black tail seemed to laugh. He had enormous eyes and what looked to be sharp teeth. His clawed feet clung to the windowsill. “You will have to excuse me, Your Highness. I wanted to see what all the fuss was about…and to beg a moment of your time on behalf of my family.”
“I don’t know what I could do for your family.” She was almost certain the creature was a phooka, though she’d never seen one up close. A phooka could be a dangerous thing, but sometimes they bonded to other beings and became deeply loyal. A bonded phooka would burn down the plane for its “family.”
The phooka’s eyes narrowed to slits. “You could do a hell of a lot more than you’re doing now, Your Highness. Has cowardice been good to you?”
The words hurt because she saw some truth to them. “Please go away.”
The laugh that huffed from the phooka’s mouth couldn’t be termed humorous. “No. Not until you learn a thing or two. Tell me something, Your Highness. What gives you any right to wear a crown? Is there anything about you that is meaningful besides the fact that whatever brat you spill from your thighs will have royal blood?”
The creature was pulling at her every nerve. “I have done nothing to deserve your scorn.”
“Oh, yes, you have done nothing and doing nothing absolutely deserves my scorn. You ran when the palace fell. I can forgive you that. You were a child. But a woman stands before me now. A woman who has done nothing while her people are slaughtered, while innocent bondmates have been taken to Torin’s hags and tortured and turned into weapons to be used against our once allies. You are a woman who has done nothing while her kin have suffered, fought, and died rallying behind her family name. Did you know your cousin Keir died?”
Her sweet cos, Keir, had only been a few years older than she was, but she knew the story. After Torin had killed her father, Keir had raised an army.
And his army had been slaughtered, Keir along with them.
“Other revolts have been started all under the Finn banner. But Bronwyn Finn hid and plowed her fields and kept her head down. You still have a head. Many of the brave ones don’t.”
“What is your point? If it’s to make me feel bad, then you win.”
“My point is that it is past time for you to be a woman. My family has a daughter named Paige. She’s already made a heart bond with a young man named Charles. Charles was taken and sent to the palace because he could bond. Paige has been placated by the fact that the boy’s fathers are promising to free him. If they cannot, then I fear Paige will try herself because my young Paige is more woman than you can ever be. And she will die and that will break my master’s heart forever. I fight for the ones I love, Bronwyn Finn. It is too bad you cannot say the same.”
“You will call me Your Highness and you will keep a civil tongue in your head around me. Is that understood?” If she was going to do this, she would do it right. No one of sane mind would follow a mild-mannered peasant princess, but she remembered her father’s arrogance well.
Her father. He’d become a sluagh and left instructions for her. Sir Giles. Niall wanted her to go to Sir Giles. She sought her memory. Sir Giles was a landholder not too far away.
Who should she trust?
“Now that sounds more like a royal who might be worth something.” The phooka’s mouth curved up in an approximation of a smile. “You know if you stay here, your husbands will cart you back to the Unseelie plane and you’ll spend the rest of your life spitting out their heirs. I’ve spent some time with them. I’ve got no doubt they want you, but they will keep you in the palace, away from anything to tax your lovely brain. You’ll be their sweet wife, coddled and loved and marginalized. Is that what you want? Or do you want more?”
Perhaps once she could have been satisfied with being a wife and a mother as her own had been, but she’d been changed. Pain, loss, and work had transformed her.
She didn’t want to sit on the sidelines as her mother had done. If she wore a crown, it would be because she’d earned it. She’d already given her blood. It was time to give more.
Shim and Lach. They had been in her dreams for so long, but she had to deal with reality. Reality was the Seelie plane and Torin.
“Help me escape.”
The phooka practically purred. “It will be my greatest pleasure, Your Highness. I am your servant.”
“Turn around. I need to get dressed.”
The phooka turned. With shaking hands, she dressed. When she was ready, she looked at the bed where she’d lost her innocence. Given it. No matter what potion she’d been under, she’d wanted them. She’d loved them.
The phooka guided her out the window, and Bron wondered if she would ever see them again.
Chapter Twelve
